‘Cult’ Mom Lori Vallow Arrested In Hawaii, Months After Her Two Kids Went Missing
Feb. 21 2020, Updated 6:42 p.m. ET
The Kaua’i Police Department, working with a warrant issued by authorities in Idaho, placed “cult” mom Lori Vallow under arrest in Hawaii on Thursday night.
She is charged with two felony counts of desertion and nonsupport of dependent children. She also faces charges of arrests and seizures — resisting or obstructing officers, criminal solicitation to commit a crime, and contempt of court — as well as willful disobedience of court process or order.
She is currently being held on $5 million bond. '
In a press release, the Madison County Prosecuting Attorney in Idaho claims Vallow “abandoned her two minor children, delayed law enforcement’s attempts to locate her children, and encouraged another individual to delay law enforcement’s attempts to locate her children.”
As RadarOnline.com previously reported, Vallow’s son, 7-year-old Joshua “J.J.” Vallow, and her daughter, Tylee Ryan, 17, have not been seen since September.
Vallow, 46, and her husband, Chad Daybell, 51, have been on the run for months.
When the couple showed up in Hawaii, a court ordered Vallow to produce her children to officials in Idaho before January 30. She failed to comply.
“First of all, we wish to thank the public for the massive outpouring of concern regarding this case,” Kaua’i Chief of Police Todd G. Raybuck said in a statement after Vallow’s arrest. “We also want to thank everyone for their patience while investigators worked diligently to comprehensively gather everything they needed in order to obtain this arrest warrant.”
According to the Madison County prosecuting attorney, Vallow faces a maximum of 14 years in prison on each count of desertion of a child.
The disturbing story began to unfold in July 2019, when Vallow’s estranged husband, Charles Vallow, 62, was shot dead by her 51-year-old brother, Alex Cox, inside her home in Chandler, Arizona.
In September, Vallow and her young kids, J.J. and Tylee, moved to Rexburg, Idaho. There, Vallow continued her romance with Daybell, the author of several religious-themed fiction books about prophecies and the end of the world.
In October 2019 — one month after the kids were last seen — Daybell’s ex-wife, Tammy, 49, was found dead in her family home. Officials at first said she died of natural causes, but they have since ruled her passing as suspicious. Vallow and Daybell married two weeks after Tammy's death.
Cox, who had shot Vallow's ex, then suddenly died in mysterious circumstances in December. Authorities have not yet released a cause of death.